Oh I forgot you didn't have AHCI. To be honest, you're going to be fighting a losing battle. AHCI is required for 10.6 upwards. There might be some patched versions that some chumps put together but it's not worth the hassle. Any update is liable to break it and I doubt it'll be stable.

Hmm looks like they are all PCI-Express and my board has no PCI-E slots (other than for the graphics card).

I read about someone who did install 10.8 on a non-AHCI machine by modifying something, but details are sketchy because no doubt most people will have an AHCI capable machine.

Wouldn't bother me to use an old version of OSX, and just not update it (to avoid breaking it) - it isn't something I'd use very often. The idea was to use my existing old hardware rather than actually spend any money.

In fact though, given how easy it has been to install it on my existing machine without it affecting my Windows installation, I could just as easily install it on my forthcoming new build which will obviously have AHCI.

There are a few PCI ones about but if you don't want to spend anything I'd literally chuck the thing in the bin and do it on the new one instead. You could always pull the old HDD and use it in the new system for OSX. It's easier to have them on completely separate drives when you dual boot rather than partitioning.

__________________Threads are being trashed and derailed with petty squabbles and insults. Nobody minds a bit of banter but it soon descends into insults and the thread is ruined.

Neither myself or iam want to spend hours cleaning threads up and dealing with RTM's so do us a favour and reign it in a bit please.